Things Will Change
by Gothicragdoll
Summary: 5 is sick of 9's nativity, and wants him to face that life isn't going to get better, and things won't change. He wants 9 to accept that the machines are going to kill them all. Things will never change.


Things will change

I just had to get out of the cathedral. There was more noise then I was use to and it was starting to irritate me. No…he was starting to irritate me. I watched 9 as he talked excitedly to 2 and 7. I just can't get my head around it. How can he be so happy all the time? No matter what happened he could find something, no matter how small it was, to be happy about. He just doesn't understand how bleak things are. He keeps saying that things could get better, but I don't think so. I want to scream at him that this is it. There is nothing more to this life.

I sighed as I got up and left the cathedral. Suddenly I felt sad and didn't know why because I know I'm right. I know there is nothing more we can do to make our lives better. I know we were meant to die out here. It's like we were created as toys for the monsters.

I understand he is young and hasn't been living long, but I wish he could just realize that it isn't going to get better. I tried to stop thinking about it. The point of this walk was to be alone and relax awhile. To get away from his…happy-no-matter-what-attitude.

I thought I had made it out of the cathedral grounds alone, but all of the sudden I heard his voice. I flinched and turned when I heard him call my name.

"Hey, 5!" 9 came running up to me. "Where are you going?" he asked once he was beside me.

"Where could I possibly go in this wasteland?" I asked aloud. There isn't anywhere special one could go here. This place was full of ruins, trash, and other unidentifiable objects. I started walking and he proceeded to follow. I silently prayed that he would go back to the cathedral, but I knew better.

"I don't know." He shrugged. "You've been alive longer, so I thought you'd have some place you like to be."

"Well I don't." I said.

We walked silently side by side. I was quite amazed by this. Usually he talked endlessly about so many things at once. I noticed he would glance at me a couple of times and then look forward again. I was beginning to wonder what he was thinking about. It was really annoying me when he would look around and smile.

I finally asked, "Okay, why aren't you talking?" I just couldn't take it anymore. I admit I came out here for tranquility, but him beside me, being quiet nonetheless, just isn't working. Even in his silence I could hear him. He may not be making noise, but the silence was becoming more then I could bear.

He shrugged. "Didn't want to ruin the beauty of it."

"Of what?" I asked. I looked around wondering what he meant. He stopped walking and stared at me. I stopped walking as well and looked at him. I noticed a smile creeping onto his face. "What?" I asked. He started to laugh. It wasn't a mocking or malicious laugh. It was a laugh of nonbelief.

"What do you mean 'of what?" he asked still smiling.

I was speechless. I finally looked away from him. "5…"I didn't look back up when he said my name. I heard him walk over to me. He put his hand on my shoulder. "5." He said my name again. I looked up at him. He was no longer smiling. I couldn't tell exactly what his face was trying to express. It looked like a mixture of confusion and sadness. I had never seen him look like that before and it frightened me. I reached up and grabbed his wrist and took his hand off my shoulder.

I didn't remove his hand because I couldn't stand him touching me. I did it out of worry. "9." I said. This time he looked away form me. We stood there for a few seconds. Suddenly he looked up at me.

"You really don't know. Do you?"

"Tell me." I whispered. He smiled to my relief and jerked his wrist away from me. He looked around.

"This place is beautiful. Full of interesting things we've never seen before. Just look." He pointed up to the sky. I looked up to see a sky full of clouds tainted with smog and smoke. I looked back at him and he looked at me. "Do you see it?"

"I see it." I said.

"Tell me what you see." He smiled, but this smile seemed to challenge me.

I shrugged. "The clouds in a filthy sky."

He shook his head. "That's where you're wrong." I started to argue but he kept talking. "I see the sky emerald green with white speckles dancing across it. I see a sun trying to find it's way through the clouds."

I looked up, but I didn't see what he was talking about. Suddenly he grabbed me and dragged me to the top of a pile of things that the humans left behind. He turned me around and I couldn't believe what I saw. The sun was trying to come out of the clouds and it looked heavenly. Why hadn't I seen this before? I had seen the sky before, but all I saw was a tarnished sky filled gross looking clouds. It didn't seem special to me at all, but this…what 9 had showed me was beautiful.

Tragically beautiful and it was tragic because to me it seemed like a representation of our lives. We are the sun trying to fight our way through the clouds, but the clouds are still over powering us. There was nothing we could do about it either.

For some odd reason I wasn't sad either about it. The view was too enchanting to be sad. I looked at 9 and smiled at him. He was too busy looking at the scene to notice. I watched him close his eyes in serenity. I looked back at the sunrays.

"Hey!" I jumped when he shouted. He let go of my hand and started to run down the pile.

"9!" I shouted. "Come back!" I ran after him, tripping every once in a while. Had he seen one of the monsters? I started to panic.

He stopped in front of a house. I finally caught up to him. "What are you doing?" I asked.

"I know this place." He said and walked into a hole that would have been a door.

"How can you know this place?" I asked.

"I don't know." He said looking around. "I just do."

We stood in a hallway. There was a small table with a broken vase on it. The whole place was a mess. He smiled happily and looked around. He walked into one room and laughed. I walked into the room with him. It was really empty except for rubble and a few objects that were still intact. I smiled when I saw him next to some destroyed toys. They were a lot bigger then us and I laughed at how little he looked next to them.

"You said you know this place, but how?" I asked, "Have you been here before?"

He shrugged. "I sometimes dream about places. Perhaps this is from a forgotten dream I had a long time ago."

I thought about this for awhile and looked up to find he was gone. I frantically looked around the room for him. "9!" I shouted. I found him in another room and ran after him. "Don't do that again. I had no clue where you went…9?" he was just staring at something. I looked over to see what he was looking at.

I gasped at the sight of dead humans. They stank and their bodies were distorted and decaying. It was a horrifying sight. I looked at 9. I felt bad that he had to see this. It seemed funny to me. An hour ago I wished something like this would happen, but now…I wish it hadn't. I didn't want him to lose his innocence. Not yet anyway.

I grabbed his arm. "Come on, 9." I whispered. "Let's go." I took his other hand and turned him around. He followed me outside of the house silently. I was worried when he didn't speak. We were on our way back to the cathedral, but I stopped and thought about the wire and the battery I found. I took his arm again.

"Follow me." I said. He looked confused, but was curious enough to obey. I started looking around in the endless pile of things.

"What are you looking for?" he asked.

"A light bulb." I stated.

"What's that?" he asked.

"You'll see." I said. "We use to have one, but it broke."

I climbed over a pile and he followed. I finally saw one and smiled. "9, come help me." I said after studying it for a few seconds. I watched him as he set down a magnifying glass. "Hold on to this while I pull." He nodded and did as he was told. It took a few tugs, but I got the light bulb off. On the last tug we both flew backwards.

When I got up I looked at it. "Beautiful." I said. He walked over to me.

"That's a light bulb?" he asked. I nodded and handed it to him. I pull the wire out of me and then the battery. "Hold the light bulb up." He did so. I put the battery under it and connect them with the wire. The light bulb lit up.

"Whoa!" 9 smiled. I laughed at his reaction. He looked at it with such amazement. I liked how childlike he looked at this point. I felt better and hoped he would forget about the dead humans.

"Keep it." I pushed all the stuff for it toward him.

"But, 5." He protested.

"It's yours. I want you to have it." He smiled and looked at his gift.

"Thank you." He said.

I took his arm and said, "We better get going. Everyone will be wondering where we ran off to." He nodded and started to walk with me. He unzipped himself and put the stuff into himself.

When we got back 6 came up to us. "9, where have you been? There is something I want you to see!" he motioned for 9 to follow. 9 looked at me.

"Go have fun with 6." I said. He smiled and walked off with 6. I sighed as I watched them walk away.

"So did you two have fun?" 2 walked up beside me.

I smiled and nodded. "I think so."

2 smiled at me. "I'm glad I sent him with you."

I looked at him. "What? You sent him to walk with me?"

2 nodded. "You've been easily irritated lately." I started to defend myself, but 2 kept talking. "I thought perhaps you needed a reminder."

"A reminder of what?" I asked.

2 looked at me with such seriousness I started to worry. "That this life is full of magic and wonder. You seem to have forgotten that over time, and don't think that I'm perfect. I have gone through a time where I forgot that as well, but you had convinced yourself that that this life isn't worth living and you haven't been able to rise above that thought."

I was embarrassed because I knew it was true. I nodded. "So I sent 9 to walk with you because I knew he could change you." I looked up at him.

"He did." I said suddenly. It was true. I couldn't believe that I had transformed into a different person completely in a matter of hours. "It was more of a change of heart then a change of mind though." 2 smiled. "I've come to see that 9 is right. Thing swill change for the better for us."

2 put his arm around my shoulder. "Now if we can get everyone here to have an attitude like that you'll be amazed at what we can do. You know what else?" I shook my head. "It only takes a few people to change the hearts of many. It just depends on which way they're being changed."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"You know how 9 can changed your heart into thinking that things could get better and how now you want to make them better?" I nodded. "It can go the other way around as well. Someone else can come along and change their hearts into thinking that things will never change and keep everyone in fear."

I looked down at the floor and thought about how I felt earlier. I had wanted to do that to 9. Poison his thinking and make him just as depressed, broken-hearted, and sad as I was. I looked back at 2 and he seemed to understand what I was feeling.

"I don't want 9 to every get that way." I said. "I want him to keep believing that things will change for the better."

2 smiled widely again. He took his arms off me and folded them across his chest. "How are you going to keep him that way?"

I thought about what I did when 9 saw the dead humans. I hoped the light bulb made him forget everything. He seemed happier after that. "I will protect him. Do whatever I can to discourage any doubting thoughts he has about his life." I said. "I can't do anything to the people who dispirit him, but I can guide his thoughts back to into thinking what he thinks now."

2 was still smiling and looked down for a second. Soon he looked back up at me. "Don't ever change from that way of thinking either." I nodded.

"I won't." I said. "Ever. I think that the only way we're ever going to change is through him. He will save us all in the end." 2 nodded and walked into his room. I stood there in the hall for awhile and thought about what happened in the past few hours. I silently prayed that 9 would never change and I also silently thanked him for what he did. Now I know things will change…for the better.


End file.
